Why would they recommend using isapi (an old technology) over URL Rewrite, which is a new technology? There's a GUI you can use through IIS, although I appreciate you can't use that on shared hosting. However, all the GUI does is creates an XML file (web.config) in your web root with the rules in.

Use the GUI on your dev server and copy up the web.config with the rest of your files, job done.

I spent several hours reading/learning more about IIS URL Rewrite Module and I can safely say that I'm simply amazed at how well it works! So, who on earth would use ISAPI_Rewrite ever again as both simple and more sophisticated rules can be added easily with URL Rewrite 2.0 (for advanced rules you need to be familiar with regular expressions ofcourse). Anyway, I will continue to read about this new technology and hopefully will be able to help someone if needed in the future